1. Field of the Invention
The field of the present invention relates to certain methods and systems for promoting the sale of goods and services. More particularly, the invention relates to methods and systems for promoting the sale of goods and services to a mass market, in a manner that creates a symbiotic-type of relationship between consumers and advertisers.
The field of e-commerce has become fiercely competitive over the past several years as numerous businesses, both new and old, have started offering goods for sale within websites and other on-line environments. Indeed, in 2007, several billions of dollars in products were estimated to have been sold over the internet. As a result, there is an ongoing and rapidly growing need for businesses to implement procedures that attract customers to their websites, advertise their goods and services, and encourage consumers to purchase such goods and services. Of course, there have been numerous types of advertising techniques used to promote the sale of goods and services, ranging from basic pay-per-click advertising and pop-up ads to other more complicated schemes, such as on-line games having an advertising component incorporated therein.
These methods, however, have grown stale—and are largely ignored by the consuming public. Moreover, such basic forms of advertising do little to encourage consumers to align their interests with those of advertisers, and to assist in promoting the sale of an advertiser's goods or services. While such marketing methods would clearly be very powerful, insofar as an advertiser would benefit from the mass marketing efforts that would result if the consumer were aligned with its interests, effective advertising methods having such features have yet to be developed.
Thus there is a continuing need for new methods of promoting the sale of goods and services, particularly methods that encourage the public to participate in the advertiser's campaign and to promote the sale of the advertiser's goods and services. As explained further below, the present invention addresses many of the foregoing needs.
2. Description of the Related Art
U.S. Pat. No. 7,318,036 discloses a method of discounting a multi-media content item, which is to be sold through a communication network, e.g., a website. This patent discloses that the discount is offered in proportion to the number of advertisements selected by a buyer to be added to the multi-media content item. This patent also discloses that multi-media content purchased by a buyer, and at least one advertisement, are selected individually within, for example, a website. The invention described in this patent requires the purchased multi-media content and the advertisement to be combined, whereupon the price of the combined content is discounted based on how many advertisements are added to the multi-media content.
However, the invention differs from this patent in several ways. First, the discount awarded to a consumer by the invention is not limited to, or necessarily connected to, the amount of times a consumer views a particular advertisement (nor the total number of advertisements viewed). Rather, the amount of the discount is dependent upon the extent to which the advertiser's sales goals are achieved, regardless of whether the sales are generated as a direct result of any particular consumer's efforts. Second, this patent does not disclose a means by which a discount awarded to a consumer, for the purchase of any type of good or service, is influenced by the sales performance of an advertiser's good/service to the public at large (as in the subject invention). Instead, this patent merely teaches a method by which a consumer may generate discounts for the purchase of a good, by agreeing to view one or more advertisements embedded in certain multi-media content.
U.S. Patent Application Publication 2007/0150537 discloses a method of advertising by which individuals allow third party vendors to publish advertisements within their personalized profiles, e.g., within a social networking website. This application discloses that an individual may control the types of advertisements that he/she will allow a vendor to publish within an individualized profile, including the types of goods/services offered and the type of on-line media used. This application also discloses that the individual who publishes a third party vendor's advertisement within his/her individualized profile may be compensated by the advertiser, e.g., for each time that the advertisement is “clicked” by a viewer.
However, the invention differs from this application in several ways. First, the discount awarded to a consumer by the invention is not limited to, or necessarily connected to, the amount of times a consumer views a particular advertisement (nor the total number of advertisements viewed). Rather, the amount of the discount is dependent upon the extent to which the advertiser's sales goals are achieved, regardless of whether the sales are generated as a direct result of any particular consumer's efforts. Second, the incentive described in this application is advertising revenue, whereas the incentive granted by the subject invention is a discount (and/or credit) applied towards the purchase of a good or service. Third, this application does not disclose, or even contemplate, the amount of an incentive (whether such incentive is in the form of a discount or advertising revenue) being influenced by the extent to which an advertiser's sales goals are achieved.
U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2007/0112636 discloses, in certain embodiments, systems and methods for facilitating the delivery of incentives from vendors to members of a community through a networked system, e.g., a website. This application discloses that upon accessing the website, the members of a community may view incentives, such as promotional materials and advertisements, which have been targeted to their community by a vendor (the community members may share one or more common characteristics). This application further discloses that, in certain embodiments, the incentive awarded to community members by a vendor that sponsors a particular advertisement may be, for example, a coupon (i.e., a form of discount applied towards the purchase of a good or service).
However, the invention also differs from this application significantly. Specifically, with the invention the amount of a discount awarded to a consumer depends on the extent to which the advertiser's overall sales goals are achieved by sales of goods/services to the public at large (wherein the relevant sales goals are tied to a particular promotion for a defined period of time). This important feature of the invention is not disclosed or even contemplated in this application.